


Tether

by sweetrosei



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Ghost Noctis, Happy Ending, M/M, Romance, not horror
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-15
Updated: 2017-12-15
Packaged: 2019-02-15 07:45:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13026462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sweetrosei/pseuds/sweetrosei
Summary: Prompto house sits for a rich couple on their Christmas holiday. Excited by all the photo opportunities, Prompto immediately loves the house. However, as the days go on he realises he's not as alone as he thought... and his unexpected company needs his help.[Hiatus]





	Tether

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tsukibeam](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tsukibeam/gifts).



> This was written for the 2017 Promptis Winter Exchange for Tsukibeam! I was hoping to get the whole thing finished in time but I got a bit carried away with it, so I had to split it into chapters...  
> There's some minor spookiness in the first chapter but it's nothing properly scary, I promise. It’s supposed to be a romance fic, not a horror.  
> I didn't tag Major Character Death since Noct's already a ghost and it's not about his death, so I didn't think it counted.

Day 1

The house was stunning. It had been passed down through the family for generations and was an interesting mix of both new and old. The current owners had gone away on a Christmas holiday from the 1st of December for a few weeks and had hired Prompto, the son of a colleague, to house sit and keep an eye on things. The owners had been victims of a burglary a few months prior and had lost some valuable belongings, and were hoping having someone around while they were away would prevent another. Prompto was more than happy to hang out in the beautiful house for a few weeks and get paid for it. The décor of the house was old but well cared for and right up Prompto’s aesthetic alley. His photographer instincts couldn’t get enough. He wanted to take photos everywhere and of everything. It was gorgeous and was only made better by the Christmas decorations all around. They’d mostly gone for classic colours, red, green, gold, etc but there was enough variation throughout the house to keep it interesting and give the house an even warmer feeling.

The first night, Prompto could barely contain his excitement. Thankfully, the owners had said he was free to go anywhere in the house so long as he was careful with their belongings. He spent the day exploring the house as much as he could before his stomach demanded its evening meal and he’d had himself a one man pizza party in the lounge with their _huge_ TV, surround sound speakers, and extensive film collection. He fell asleep on the sofa around 3am with a film still playing in the background. If this is what the rest of the few weeks would be like, he had the cushiest job ever.

Day 2

The second day, Prompto went exploring again, taking more care to look at all the details and décor this time. He’d been too shy to look at the main bedroom or the study yesterday, not wanting to pry into anything too private. However, in the late afternoon he reasoned that the study couldn’t be _too_ private if it was used like an office, right? As long as he didn’t look at any confidential work, which was probably shut away anyway, he figured it’d be fine. He crept in, trying to be as quiet and subtle as he could, despite being the only one around. He couldn’t help feeling a little like he was trespassing, but he’d been told he could go anywhere and he was too curious not to look.

The study was filled with books and work supplies, both new and old, with an expensive PC parked next to an even more expensive looking old globe. Prompto wondered if the owners ever actually used the vintage stuff or if it was kept because it was part of their history. He continued around the room, trying to take in the little details, but his eyes kept being drawn towards the swords displayed on the wall behind the desk. There were three but only one of them seemed to demand his attention. Unable to look away, he moved closer. The sword was big and looked unwieldy, and Prompto wondered if it was meant to be ornamental rather than used in battle. He reached for it, too drawn in to think about how he probably shouldn’t be touching something that could be God knows how old or fragile. He ran his fingers over the design at the handle before ghosting down the middle of the blade. It was cold but beautiful. He was already thinking about how to photograph it to get a good reflection and wanting to take close ups of the detailing. He avoided the sharp edge as he trailed his fingers over the metal but managed to nick his index finger right at the end. Although it was only a small amount, the blood still took him by surprise. Sure, he hadn’t thought the decorative blade would be completely blunt, but he hadn’t expected it _that_ sharp either.

Prompto shoved his finger in his mouth so that the blood didn’t drip anywhere as he hurried out of the room. He dreaded how upset the owners would be if he left blood stains on anything, so he rushed to the bathroom to get a plaster to be safe. That would do for his exploring for the day. He only returned to the office a little later on to make sure he’d left no marks on the sword, and happily found it was spotless, so he headed back to the lounge for a cosy evening of photo editing.

Day 3

The third night, Prompto woke up to a thump. He shot upright, fear instinctively spiking in him and blinking twice in the darkness before scrambling for the lamp beside him. He’d fallen asleep on the sofa again and for a moment he thought maybe the thump had something to do with the film he’d been watching but no, the film had long since finished and the TV had turned itself off from inactivity.

Prompto looked around the empty lounge, trying to find the source of the noise. Nothing looked like it had moved or fallen. Was it another burglar that the owners had been worried about? Prompto listened carefully trying to hear anything else. Maybe it was just a car outside or the wind or draught or part of his dream… There was another, smaller, thump in the hall and Prompto jumped again, hurrying up and over to the now-fake fireplace and grabbing the very real iron poker next to it. He quietly moved back to the sofa to grab his phone with the other hand, ready to call the police if there really was something going on.

Prompto crept over to the lounge door and hesitated, adrenalin coursing through him as he gathered the courage to open the door. He grabbed the handle and flung it open, poker raised and ready to… swear loudly and swing at the coat rack in the hall. Prompto let out a heavy breath and put the non-poker-holding hand over his heart as he tried to calm down again. Good going Prom, you protected the house from free-standing coat storage. As he recovered and looked around for any clues as to what could have caused the noise, he noticed a small shape on the floor. He crept over, worrying for a moment that the house might have mice, before realizing as he got closer that it was one of the little deer ornaments that normally sat on the table against the wall. He bent down to pick it up, looking around as he did so, wondering who or what knocked it over, and spotted a photo frame beneath the table that shouldn’t be on the floor either. Ah, that explains it! Prompto filled with relief as he realized what had probably happened. The frame must have fallen off the old wall fixings and knocked the deer ornament over before falling through the gap between the table and the wall itself. They must have been the two thumps he’d heard.

He went back to the lounge after that, trying to relax after his near-horror-movie experience and go back to sleep. Despite knowing the decorations had caused the thumps, he still couldn’t shake the creepy feeling that he wasn’t alone. What if the frame hadn’t fallen because the fixings were old but because someone had bumped it? No, that’s silly. The house is just old, that’s all. He ended up putting the TV on low in the background just to give himself a distraction, so he could eventually fell asleep again.

Day 4

It was a little after 1pm by the time Prompto awoke the next day. He was a little annoyed with himself since he’d planned to make the most of the daylight and take photographs outside the house, but he’d been exhausted after his dramatic night-time adventure and now there wouldn’t be enough time in the daylight left for a good shoot. Plus, he had a sleep related headache that he was fairly sure wasn’t going to budge any time soon. He decided to leave the photography until tomorrow and relax today. He had a few weeks in which to take the photos, so there was no real hurry, no matter how eager he was. He tried to watch films to relax but kept pausing to look around. It was probably just left-over creepiness from the events of last night, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that someone else was in the house. On the way back from the kitchen with a post-dinner snack, he’d almost dropped it everywhere when he’d jumped. He was _sure_ someone or something had been right next to him. There was no way though, right? He hadn’t seen anyone and there couldn’t be a ghost…

Prompto wasn’t exactly against believing in ghosts, he just knew that he’d rather they weren’t real just in case they acted like all the horror movies. He put on some happy fluffy movies to distract himself. Maybe the weird feeling and creaks were just a draught…

Day 5

On the fifth day, Prompto successfully made it outside and took as many photos as he could in the winter sun. It was cold but lovely and Prompto felt far freer than he had yesterday. He even ate his lunch outside, taking advantage of the outdoor heater.

Prompto decided, that evening as he flicked through the TV on demand catalogue, that he really needed to stop falling asleep on the sofa. There was a spare bedroom he was meant to use but he kept falling asleep in the lounge while watching TV instead. Maybe that was why he kept experiencing all these weird things. Perhaps he wasn’t sleeping right and it was messing with his head. That made sense. It didn’t make him feel any better though when he still fell asleep on the sofa that evening and woke up to another loud thump at 2am, this time very close to him. He jumped up, knocking the lamp over as he turned it on and leapt from the sofa at the same time. He stared around the room wildly, trying to find the source of his fear. It wasn’t the thump that had him freaking out the most this time; it was that he was 90% sure he’d just heard someone whisper “sorry”.

Day 6

The sixth day, Prompto found himself jumping at every little sound and straining his ears trying to tell if the background noise was the wind or pipes or someone whispering to him. He couldn’t be sure he’d really heard it last night but he couldn’t shake the sound of that voice either. Maybe it had been a dream or maybe it had been real. The only positive he could take from it was that they had said ‘sorry’ and not ‘die’ or ‘get out’ or something equally as scary. He didn’t fancy having to fight a ghost or phone the owners to explain why he’d called an exorcist to the house.  

Convincing himself that it most likely was just his mind playing tricks on him after sleeping on the sofa yet again, he pushed his worries down and decided to spend the day in the lounge again, chilling out and watching the TV with the sound louder than he needed and pretending his hardest that he heard nothing. By the evening, he’d calmed down a little but had also shut the curtains earlier than necessary. He now had some background music playing – still a little louder than necessary – and was looking through all the photos he’d taken on his laptop. He was checking out the photos he’d taken outside the day before when he froze in place and instantly minimised the photo. There was no way, right? He couldn’t have seen what he thought he did…

He maximised the picture again and let out a small squeak as he looked at it. In one of the windows there was a dark and foggy but undeniably person looking shape. He flicked to the next photo, the third in a burst of pictures he’d taken, and there was no person, he flicked again and the shape was back but in the next window along, as if they had walked down the corridor. Prompto’s heart raced as he hurriedly looked around him, checking the living room for any sign of anything terrifying.

Prompto stood up, pacing and trying to catch his breath and think straight. Maybe the lighting was weird. Maybe his camera was breaking. Did ghosts even show up on digital cameras anyway? Wasn’t that just on film? He grabbed his laptop again, changing to sit on the armchair in the corner of the room, back to the wall with a view of the whole room. He flicked through more photos, paying careful attention to reflective surfaces to see if anything was going on. Maybe his camera couldn’t handle reflections or certain lighting…

He made it back to the photos from the third day. The day itself had been uneventful but the night had been the time he’d woken up to that thump. It was a photo of the hallway that had his stomach dropping again. He’d been taking photos of the Christmas decorations, including the tree. Looking at it now, there was clearly something wrong with the baubles. He zoomed in closer, hoping the person shape would be a blonde dork holding a camera but as he zoomed in it became clear that it was another foggy dark person shape.

Prompto jumped up and grabbed his camera, looking at the screen as he held it up and checked out the room. His hand shook as he turned it towards the mirror, bracing himself to see a dark fog standing behind him. Prompto wasn’t a coward but he was also fully aware that he had no idea how to fight or deal with ghosts. He was way out of his league. He almost dropped his camera when he finally showed the mirror and took a picture, but there was nothing in it; just him looking terrified and no one else. He let out a heavy breath. Maybe he’d been wrong… or maybe the ghost just wasn’t here right now.

Prompto made sure he went up to the spare bedroom to sleep that evening, rather than staying on the sofa, and locked the door, even putting a chair in front of in just in case. It all made him feel a little better. There wasn’t any solid undeniable evidence that there was in fact a ghost and it wasn’t just him being sleep deprived with a breaking camera. Nevertheless, he also put some music on all night to drown out any noises. He didn’t want any more surprises.

Day 7

The next morning, Prompto woke up feeling refreshed and brave. If there was a ghost, then they didn’t necessarily have to be an evil one. They hadn’t done anything to try and hurt him or scare him away. If he was right, they had even apologised to him at one point. Maybe they were a lost spirit that wanted help or company? Maybe they were Nearly Headless Nick? Prompto grabbed his camera and ate a quick breakfast before setting out on his mission. If there was a ghost, he was going to make sure they knew he wasn’t a threat. Of course, all of this was going to be done during daylight and he’d be locking himself away in the evening again, just in case, but he was still going to do his best. There was an important difference between bravery and curiosity, and taking unnecessary risks.

Starting at the lounge, Prompto slowly walked through the house, taking photos of all the reflective surfaces and talking as he went. “Hi! I’m Prompto! I’m house sitting for the owners. I’m here until the 20th and then I’m leaving! I’m just keeping the house company until then. I’m not a threat or anything so please don’t hurt me. If I’m disturbing you I’m really sorry, I promise I don’t mean to.” He continued talking as he walked through the rooms, introducing and explaining himself in each one while also talking about how nice the house was and eventually just rambling about little details about himself. “This is a camera. You take photographs with it. They’re a bit like paintings. I don’t know if you already know that… but I take a lot of photos! I like nature photography the most but taking photos of houses and people and stuff is cool too. This house is really pretty, especially with the Christmas decorations, so it’s really nice to photograph.”

Back in the office, he took more photos of the swords and started talking about how he’d accidentally cut himself on them. “I’m sorry if it’s a special sword or something. I’m kinda clumsy… I won’t touch it again.” He wasn’t about to risk bleeding on the fancy carpet again.

A creak behind him made him spin round, camera in hand and flash going off. “Uhh….” Prompto froze on the spot. _Oh God, oh God, oh God._ “Hello?” He asked, looking around but seeing and hearing nothing. He looked down at the camera and loaded up the photo he’d accidentally just taken. There, clear as day, was a human shape in the glass cabinet right in front of him. Prompto stepped back and stared at the cabinet in front of him. He couldn’t see anything there but the person shape was _so_ clear in the photograph. The shape wasn’t as foggy this time. They were still mostly a dark blur but the outline was becoming clearer, he could vaguely see hair and arms. “…Hi”. Prompto breathed, staring at the glass cabinet. He moved his eyes up to about where he thought the person’s eyes would be, if he could see them. “Um.”

He had no idea what to say. Were they a friendly ghost? Was he about to be gruesomely murdered? Was he just in the way and they wanted him to fuck off?

“I…. I’m Prompto. Um. You…” He turned the camera around. “This is a photo. That… that shape… that’s you. I think. Um… I can’t really see much of you but… um… it’s nice to meet you? I’m sorry if I’m causing you trouble, I really don’t mean to. Um. Um.” Fear was starting to build up in him. There was something about being in the same room as someone but not being able to see them or know what they were doing that was deeply unsettling and setting off alarm bells. The longer he stood there the more strongly he could _feel_ that he was not alone. There _was_ someone right in front of him. “I. uh. Fuck” Prompto started stepping towards the exit, facing the cabinet the whole time. “I’m gonna go but er- yeah, it was good to um- I’m not a threat okay so uh… let’s be pals? Okay! Yeah! Bye!” His fight or flight – flight specifically – mechanism finally took control and he ran away from the room and all the way to his bedroom, slamming the door before shoving the chair in front of it again. He scrambled over to the bed and curled up, wrapping his arms around his knees. As he sat there, he kept taking photos around him, checking them out to make sure he was alone.

An hour later he’d calmed down enough to look back through his photos from earlier. He started at the beginning, in the lounge, and worked his way through. It took a double take for him to spot the first sign of the ghost. It was from the stairway, reflected in one of the photo frames. The ghost shape was at the top of the stairs and Prompto could clearly see arms and legs as if they were walking by. He continued flicking and found the ghost again in the upstairs bathroom. He’d been focused on the mirror at the time but now that he was looking at it on his laptop, he could see the shape reflected in the tiles. This time, they were in the doorway, looking as if they were leaning on the doorframe. Did ghosts lean on doorframes? That certainly didn’t seem like threatening behaviour, at least.

Finally, he made it to the photos of the office. He braced himself as he loaded the first one up. There was nothing in it so far, no matter how carefully he looked. The first sign appeared in the photo of the swords. On his camera screen, he hadn’t been able to see it, but on his laptop he could make out a shape behind him reflected in the blades. If he looked hard enough, he could see something in most of the photos of the room after that. The clearest, of course, was the one of the cabinet when he’d come face to face – sort of – with the ghost. They were a dark fuzz with what seemed like messy hair and one hand on their hip. A sassy ghost? Prompto snorted a laugh. Well, he could certainly deal with a sassy non-threatening ghost. He’d take that over a murderous ghost any day. Part of him felt a little safer knowing that the ghost had followed him through half of the house and stood with him in that room all that time, let alone seven days, and hadn’t done anything to hurt him. Maybe they just wanted to chill? Prompto felt a twinge of guilt for running away before figuring that the ghost would understand… surely… I mean, how else is someone suppose to react?

Prompto didn’t leave the bedroom until dinner. He might have convinced himself that it wasn’t a horrendously awful idea to continue to stay in the house with a friendly-so-far ghost, but he wasn’t quite ready to go for a brave long wander through the halls in the dark yet. He hurried down to the kitchen, turning every light on on the way, and heated up a microwave meal that he’d brought with him before rushing back to the bedroom to eat it. Everything was quiet until he went to the bathroom before bed. He’d left music playing in the bedroom but it didn’t quite reach the bathroom, so there was no escaping the fact that he heard a quiet raspy “Sorry” behind him. Prompto span around, half terrified and holding up the camera to take a quick photo. There was the shape again, standing in the hallway. Prompto backed into the wall and stared at the hallway and the photo frames, trying to see _anything_ with his own eyes.

“Sorry? For… for what?” Prompto asked but got nothing in reply. He was shaking a little but trying to act brave. The ghost hadn’t tried to him hurt him… yet. “You’re not saying sorry because you’re about to viciously murder me, right? Because, y’know, I’d rather you didn’t do that at all…”

“No,” came the rough disembodied reply.

Prompto gasped and jolted back into the wall at the word. The voice was still quiet and raspy, like an ill person struggling to speak and Prompto wondered if the ghost normally sounded like that or if it was a strain for the ghost to talk.

“No? Well, that’s- that’s good. I’m glad. Um. Is… is it hard to talk to me?”

The reply sounded as if it had been cut off but Prompto thought it sounded a little like a yes. “I’m sorry… I don’t want to cause you trouble. I… you don’t have to talk to me if you don’t want to. Unless you do, in which case that’s okay? I think? I mean, as long as you don’t want to kill me then I’m cool with talking to a ghost I guess.” Prompto pulled a face as he continued rambling. Smooth, Prompto, very smooth.

“Um do you… do you want to keep talking to me? Or should I go away? Uhhhh… make a sound if you want to keep talking to me?”

Prompto stood there in silence, feeling more and more uncomfortable until there was a very soft sound, almost like a frustrated grunt.

Prompto felt guilty. Maybe it was painful to talk. “I’m… look, I’d love to talk more but I don’t want you to hurt yourself? So I’m… I’m gonna go back to my bedroom and I’ll like… I’ll turn the music down low and you can rest or whatever you need to do and you can come talk to me again when you feel up to it?”

Day 8

Prompto didn’t hear any more from the ghost after the brief interaction the night before, but he felt oddly more comfortable after it. The ghost didn’t want to hurt him and it wanted to talk to him. That sounded alright. He could handle that. It was still kind of terrifying when he really thought about it, but hey, at least he wasn’t in a horror film. He spent the day with the TV on, barely paying attention to it as day time TV faded into the background and he played games and browsed the internet on his laptop. He was pretty sure the entire nativity story was on in the background at some point. At least, he assumed that was what the barn scene he’d briefly seen was for. That, or daytime soaps were getting very retro.

Pushing his laptop to the side a little, Prompto leant forward to grab his drink from the table. His laptop wobbled a little as he drank but he managed to stop it falling off his laptop completely before he returned his drink to the coaster on the table. He laughed at a stupid joke on TV before readjusting his laptop and returning to the photography forum thread he’d been replying to, only to stop and stare at the message box. Most of the message had been what he’d been writing, giving praise for the photos the original poster had shared, but the last few words weren’t.

> _Hi. I’m Noctis_

Prompto let out a rushed breath. “ _Jesus_!”

Prompto stared as the keys on his keyboard started moving. They moved a little jittery and very slowly, as if the person pressing them was having trouble doing so. The keys weren’t particularly hard to press for Prompto but maybe they were for someone without… a proper form.

> _No, I’m Noctis_

Prompto stared at the message for a moment before the joke clicked into place and he burst out laughing. _Oh my God._ He really did have a sassy ghost. He covered his mouth as he laughed, giggling a little as all the tension he’d just experienced fizzled and merged with the ridiculous situation. He tried to recover as quickly as he could, not wanting to miss his chance to talk, but he couldn’t stop giggling as he replied.

“Sorry! Hi Noctis, I’m Prompto. It’s nice to meet you.”

He moved the laptop to the side a little, assuming it’d make it easier for the ghost to reach from… wherever they were. Prompto watched as the little emoji menu opened up and a happy face was selected. Prompto stared. A ghost was sending him emojis. Also, the ghost was surprisingly good with his technology. Had they learnt it over time or were they a new ghost?

“Um. Are you. Are you a guy? girl? NB?”

> _guy_

“Cool! Me too. How old are you?”

> _20_

“Same!” Prompto was shocked. They were the same age? Did that mean Noctis was 20 when he… became a ghost?

“Is this easier? To talk to me?”

> _yes_

Prompto smiled but was cut off by more typing before he could reply.

> _ish_

“Ish? Okay. So not great…”

> _getting stronger_

Noctis was getting stronger? That was good, right? “Good? I mean, good. I’m glad. I think.”

> _i won’t hurt you_

Prompto smiled at the message. “Glad to hear it.”

Prompto didn’t get much more information from Noctis after that. Noctis grew tired and went to rest, wherever ghosts went to rest, and Prompto carried on checking the forums. It was a little odd, feeling so comfortable knowing there was a ghost in the house and talking to him, especially when he’d been so scared at first, but it was kind of exciting too. Now that Prompto was sure Noctis wasn’t a threat, he wanted to know more about him. Maybe he could help Noctis somehow. The least he could do was keep him company.

Day 9

A knocking on his door dragged Prompto from his sleep. It wasn’t an urgent knocking, but a tentative one. As if someone wanted his attention but also didn’t want to wake him up.

Prompto mumbled as he sat up before answering properly. “Come in?” He rubbed his eyes and blinked as he remembered where he was. He was in the spare room of the house he was looking after. There was no one else in the house. No one alive anyway. “Noctis?”

There was an answering tap, this time coming from the chest of drawers, and Prompto assumed Noctis had come in. He held in a slightly hysterical laugh at the realization that door hadn’t opened and those times when Prompto had locked and barricaded his door for safety… it really wouldn’t have helped at all.

“Good morning! How are you today?” Prompto asked with a bright smile before remembering that Noctis struggled to speak. He bent over to grab his laptop but paused as he heard a raspy voice nearby.

“Help… me?”

Prompto sat up straight, eyes wide and staring in the direction he thought the voice came from. “Help you? Are you okay? What happened?” He flipped open the laptop, hurrying to turn it on in case it made communication easier.

“Ground.” Noctis’ voice struggled to reply

“Ground? Outside? The garden?” Thankfully his laptop was fast to load – he needed a good system in order to run all his editing programs without frustration – so he quickly opened a text editor and put the laptop down next to him.

> _Sword_

“Sword? Ground the sword? Put the sword in the ground?” Prompto asked, trying to work out what Noctis wanted.

> _Go to the sword_

“…okay.” Prompto climbed off the bed and grabbed the laptop before walking towards the office where the swords were displayed, assuming Noctis was following him.

A tiny part of him wondered if he was about to be murdered by a sword wielding ghost but he quickly brushed it away. He hadn’t known Noctis long but he felt good about him. He could trust him. He knew it.

“Okay,” Prompto put the laptop on the desk before looking to the swords, “which one?” He stood in front of them and gasped as he saw Noctis reflected in one without having to look through his camera. The ghost was still a dark grey shape but his outline was far clearer than before. He no longer had a fuzz around him. Prompto watched the shape bend and Prompto turned as he heard keys being pressed. He waited as Noctis typed.

> _When you touched it, you woke me. I need you to do it again. Your blood grounds me to this world._

“My blood?” Prompto stared wide eyed at the laptop screen.

> _Only a little. Like before._

Basically a papercut then? “Oh… oh okay. It won’t… I’ll be okay right?”

> _Yes. I promise. Nothing bad will happen to you._

Prompto hesitated a few seconds more, feeling a little doubt before deciding he still trusted Noctis, so he would help. He reached toward the sword again. He wasn’t sure exactly what he was supposed to do so he ran his fingers along it the same way he had the first time he’d come in here, before running his middle finger over the sharp edge. He cut a little deeper than before but nowhere near what could be considered a deep cut. Noctis had said he only needed a little, after all.

Prompto kept his finger on the sword, letting his blood stay on it but making sure it didn’t drip onto the carpet. “Is this okay?” He wasn’t sure how much help this little would be, but when he turned around he had his answer. He didn’t need the reflection to see Noctis now. The grey blur from the reflection was visible in front of him, no mirror needed. “Oh my God.”

“Yeah…” Noctis replied, his voice a little rough but no longer sounding like he was struggling to speak.

“Oh my God.” Just a little blood had done all of this?

“Thank you.” Noctis replied, sounding genuinely warm and grateful.

“Should I…? Should I do more? It’ll help more, right?” Prompto offered, willing to do so.

“No. It’s okay. I’ll keep getting stronger now. This is enough.” Noctis replied and Prompto felt like he could tell Noctis was smiling.

“I’m… I’m glad.” Prompto pulled his finger away from the sword and put it in his mouth again to stop the bleeding running elsewhere. “I should put a plaster on this. I don’t think the owners would want me bleeding on any more of their things…” He looked back at the sword to see how much blood was on it only to find it spotless. He blinked a little, trying to work out how that had happened before his eyes changed focus and he realized what he could see behind him. Noctis may be a grey shape when he faced him directly now, but in his reflection he was so much clearer. “I can see you…”

Noctis was still a little blurry, like a photograph that’s out of focus, but he had colour and features. Prompto could see the colour of his hair, skin, clothes, he could even blurrily see his eyes and mouth. “Holy shit.”

Noctis smiled at him. “Do I look as you expected?”

Prompto shook his head ‘no’ before re-evaluating his answer. “Actually… I’m not really sure what I expected.”

“I’m sorry for scaring you at first.” Noctis replied, stepping forward a little. “I didn’t know what was happening or how to talk to you.”

“You didn’t?” Prompto turned to face the blur. It was more unsettling looking at the grey blur than the clearer reflection, but it seemed less awkward and more polite. “Are you a new ghost then?” Prompto asked before realising that was definitely _not_ polite.

“Sort of… it’s…” the grey blur flickered, disappearing for a second, “complicated.”

“Woah, are you okay? Do you need to rest?” Prompto asked, turning to get a look at the reflection and see if he could recognise any emotion on Noctis’ out-of-focus face.

“Yeah. I’ll explain later, I promise.” Noctis turned and Prompto thought he looked a little nervous, although the blurriness wasn’t helping. “Maybe we could… watch a film?”

Prompto smiled brightly, relieved and excited by the suggestion. The ghost he’d been scared of at first had turned out to be a sweet, slightly nervous, sassy film lover who looked blurry but kind of cute and wanted to hang out and watch films with him. Prompto could _definitely_ get used to this. “Hell yeah! Gonna watch a film with my ghost buddy!”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I’d really love to hear what you all think of this!  
> As always, you can find me on tumblr as sweetrosei.
> 
> Edit, August 2018: I have massive writers block for this fic and I've been telling myself to get this finished before I start writing any new fics, but all that's done is sap my motivation to write anything at all and, to me, not writing anything is worse than putting this on hold and writing something new.  
> Therefore, I'm putting this fic on indefinite hiatus. I'm not saying it's completely cancelled as I _might_ one day come back to it if inspiration strikes. If you've read this and you have any ideas or feedback that might give me inspiration, feel free to drop them in a comment, but I can't promise anything. I'm sorry.


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